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Staying true to the theme of the 2025-2026 legislative session, lawmakers have greenlit several of the most significant policies of the session, each aimed at expanded immigration enforcement and further criminalizing those not lawfully present in the state, by targeting drivers for whom English is not their first language and requiring local governments to report noncitizens to the authorities.
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Many of the state’s anti-immigrant policies came directly from the White House and are designed to make local governments assist in President Donald Trump’s national crackdown on immigration.
Among those is HB 1710 by Rep. Dennis Powers (R-Jacksboro), a sweeping tracking bill which requires anyone seeking a state-funded public benefit to prove their citizenship and requires service providers like hospitals to report anyone who cannot prove they are legally present to the state’s Central Immigration Enforcement Division.
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The bill passed the House 73-21 and is on the Senate calendar for its final vote on Wednesday.
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Another bill that made it through the House this week is HB 2219, which mandates sheriff’s offices across the state to enter into partnerships with ICE turning a voluntary program into a requirement, and threatening to withhold funding from law enforcement agencies that don’t comply.
At the beginning of 2025, only two of the law enforcement agencies in the state were voluntarily participating in the federal 287(g) program. Since lawmakers passed an incentive program providing $5 million in extra funding to those agencies that opted in to help in federal immigration enforcement, that number has grown to 70.
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Sheriffs will be able to choose which of the 287(g) agreements they enter — which vary from just reporting undocumented inmates to ICE to actively helping make immigration-related arrests –— but will be required to join some tier of the program, or the state will withhold grant funding.
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Ultimately, the bill passed 74-22, with Republican Rep. Jody Barrett (R-Dickson) joining Democrats in voting against the bill, which had already passed the Senate and now heads to the governor to sign into law.
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In the same meeting, lawmakers passed a pair of driver’s license bills, including HB 1708, which requires drivers to pass the state driver’s license test in English after an 18-month grace period, despite pushback from businesses with international employees and even the Japanese Consulate.
They also targeted out-of-state commercial licenses by passing HB1817, which requires law enforcement to issue “out-of-service” orders to commercial drivers who cannot speak English “sufficiently to converse with the general public.” Democrats criticized the bill, noting that drivers may have the English proficiency to read street signs without necessarily having conversational English proficiency.
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The post Tennessee House Mandates 287(g), Aggressive Immigration Status Tracking Among Other Anti-Immigrant Bills appeared first on American Renaissance.
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